Yesterday, news broke that Nintendo of America’s Reggie Fils-Aime – the President of the company who ushered in the Wii era, saw them through the Wii U era, and launched Nintendo back into relevance with the Switch – will be stepping down come April.
For Nintendo fans, this wasn’t just news of an executive leadership change—Reggie has been a fan-facing figure for over a decade with his fan interactions, his appearances at trade shows, conventions, and Nintendo’s Direct presentations, and the sheer number of memes he has bestowed upon the gaming community (most historically, “my body is ready”). It’s just a general bummer overall then that he will be stepping down.
News of his retirement was greeted with congratulations on his tenure and his achievements by many across the gaming industry—including head of PlayStation’s Worldwide Studios Shawn Layden, head of Xbox Phil Spencer, the official DOOM account, the official Square Enix account, and more. You can see these tweets for yourself below.
Reggie Fils-Aime leaves a massive legacy in his wake—now to see if his successor Doug Bowser (yes, really) will be able to live up to it.